Dressage Pro Photos Silver Hills

Blogger won't let me edit my last post so I'm dumping these photos here.



Doesn't she look fancy?

Silver Hills ODE October 2017 - Dressage

So, after Jump Club I decided that I would enter Allie and I in for the 80cm intro at Silver Hills t the end of October. Neither of us were really fit, and I hadn't been doing any dressage, so yeah, of course I thought it would be a good idea.

In the weeks leading up to it I had a couple of lessons with Linda and Allie gave us both the best most amazing walk and trot work of her life, and the worst bullshit mare crap I have ever had from her. Literally she would be trotting along beautifully into the contact, with a lovely cadence and I would dare to ask for inside flexion and BAM - she would throw in a stop and nothing would get her moving again, not pony-club kicks, not cracks of the whip, not Linda waving her arms, and she would even back up all the way across the arena, until finally she would rear, I would pull her down, and she would trot off again like nothing happened. Every time this happened I just followed the contact and didn;t give her the release that way but she keeps bloody trying it.

Anyway. Friday I rode alone and it was bloody awful. Full blown high-ho Silver moments, and the rest of it was tense and yuck. Thankfully Linda drove down to warm us up for dressage on the Saturday.

Warm up went fairly well, considering. We had one big rear (that no one caught on film, sadly) but the rest of it I rode the very damn best I could and Allie truly appreciated it.

This photo was taken after her one big rear in the warm up. She had her hissy fit, then decided I was in charge after all. She got a nice rest for that epiphany

Discussing the game plan

After this we went looking for arena 1, which was not where we thought it was. Luckily I was running early so I got to the arena right on time.

Here's the test.

I'm fairly happy with the test, for the most part. The right canter she picked up the wrong lead because I bumped her with my outside leg, but she came back to me easily and popped straight into the correct lead the second time. Out free walk was not what it should have been. Just as my test started a bloody great green tractor turned up and started driving around doing god-knows-what so that didn't help.

Here's my test paper:

64%. We were sitting in 21st out of 30-something riders. Not bad for our only dressage outing of the year, with only about 7 dressage rides all year at home. Haha.


Next up - cross country.

Camden Equestriad - Dressage!

Ok guys, spoiler alert - my mare is fantastic!


So as I've said we entered the Camden Equestriad newcomers and I got my draw early in the week. It was super civilised with dressage at 3.02pm, XC at 4.45pm on the Saturday and Showjumping at 2.20pm on the Sunday.

I pulled in at 9am on Saturday because I didn't have my sister to help me for the first time ever (she was away for the weekend). I was also worried about parking but I shouldn't have been, there was plenty.

It was a beautiful day!!

Allie seemed much more settled than she had at SIEC a couple of weekends ago, and settled in to eat some of her breakfast while I plaited up. About an hour later I saw Debbi's float pull in and about 20 minutes after that she called me to see where I was - I said I was about to go walk cross country and that I would find her float on the way up there. It was a bit funny because I walked around the float next to me and there was Debbi's float - she had parked about 15 second walk away and we had no idea haha.

Anyway, off we went to walk the course. The footing was AMAZING - we had a little light rain during the week but there was no mud - just beautiful easy footing. The only things on XC that worried me was a ditch (it was tiny, we could walk over it if we wanted) and trying to canter down hill. The course itself was awesome and I was excited to ride it! None of the jumps scared me. Good stuff!

Debbi's dressage was about an hour before mine but I tacked up and walked down there at the same time and just let Allie graze for a good hour or so. I wanted to get on her at about 2pm, but ended up getting on at 1.45 because my lower back was getting sore from standing there!

Looking cute in a borrowed bonnet. Fancy in the background scratching his face on a tree. He's very cute!

Lucky I did go down to dressage warm up so early, because on the way I asked Deb how she thought Fancy would go in the test and she started talking about a stretchy trot and I was like "what stretchy trot?". I had learned the wrong test!

Thank god for smart phones - I downloaded the correct test and spent my time watching my class and reading the test before warming up. Once I hopped on, I concentrated on getting Allie through tot he bridle and relaxed, lots of over bending and nice quiet transitions. She did really well, but I can tell she's due some body work because she is stiff in the left side of her neck and left shoulder so found it hard to over bend to the right.

My other (non-horsey) sister Erin was coming to watch with her family and Allie was feeling really good about half an hour before the test (there was so much room in the warm up that I was able to run through the whole test off to the side and she did great) so I let her walk out on the buckle to go find Erin. We came back to the warm up with 10 minutes to spare and I just tested that she still had her head screwed on before presenting to the judge.

After presenting, Allie had a bit of a spaz out - she was wearing an ear bonnet that Deb had lent to me because there were a trillion flying ants around, but I think something bit her. I did an extra circle up at A and then headed on down the centreline to halt at X.

Erin got video of the test, I'll let it speak for itself.

Here's our paper:

So we got a 66.59%!!! Very happy with my 7 for rider. Not many comments to go from but I know what we need to work on. We have spent the last few weeks getting her really through and forward into the bridle - now to refine that!

Fancy went really well in his test too for a green horse with only 2 weeks prep after a 12 month spell after retiring from racing, Deb is a great rider and really helped him through it.

Back to the float to chill out for a little while, eat some food, then get on with tacking up for cross country!!

Sneak Peek

We had a dressage lesson last Saturday. Here's a sneak peek, full write up (with videos that are pretty freakin funny tbh) to follow!

Schooling pics and videos

Natalie schooled both horses today (I'm out for a few days due to my kicked leg) and I got some photos and videos of both horses.

Lots of me talking in the videos - please don't mind me :p. My commentary in the video kind of shows what is going on anyway, so you may as well listen to it.

Let me know how you think Nat did! I think she is an excellent rider with a good feel and a lovely seat.

Video:

Video:

Lesson Videos

Had another lesson with Ann today. Gracie and Nat came to have a lesson after mine too. While we were getting ready a horse galloped in his yard and spooked our mares - who then proceeded to pull back, break the twine they were tied to (Gracie has NEVER done that before!) then they pranced off to disturb the lesson before us and ran all over the property causing havoc. Allie even ducked under a temporary one strand fence! Brat

Allie was amazing there as per usual. We worked on proper flexion (she tends to tip her nose to the right to avoid that rein) and transitions within the trot.

It was pretty fun, the exercise we were doing - big trot, then little trot (almost walking) then immediately bog trot again, over and over. She did so well!

Then, out of the blue, Ann said "alright, now canter, don't even think about it" and suddenly she gave me the most beautiful right lead canter depart. I laughed out loud it was just perfect and easy and I can't wait to do that again.

Left canter was pretty funny - the video below shows how hard Allie tries to get it right but she just doesn't have the balance there to canter while being through anf forward into the bridle. IT's geting there though.

Seriously though - watch this video, it's pretty funny.

Photo spam of pretty well behaved ponies:

Pretty mareface!

Ann talked Nat through the whole 'lowering the neck' and 'reaching down' and 'taking control' thing. I think it is some sort of initiation into dressage? :P

Next lesson in a month's time. We certainly have some homework to do!